Crow Koan

Jet-black flyer, wintry clime,Sheen refracting sun-lit feathers,How to parse a bird so fine,Dark as pitch what e’er the weather.Can it be that such a hueCarries with it thoughts of death,Has us ponder, ask anew,What remains for us of breath?Or do such colors as the crow’s,Call attention to the light,Set against New England snows,The opposite of death and night?A deep enigma, what’s the answer?Let me ask the crow, Zen Master.

Vincent J. Cleary is retired from teaching the ancient classics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He is the author of Amherst Massachusetts 01002: One of the Best Small Towns in America (2003).